The Basics of Color Theory

In graphic design there are a few color systems that we use. CMYK and PMS for printed material and RGB for digital material. CMYK stands for cyan, magenta, yellow and black.

These pigment-based colors are mixed by printers to create a rainbow of color choices. The span of colors is large, but it does have it’s limits; particularly with blues and greens. That’s where PMS, or Pantone Matching System, comes in. It is used for specifying exact colors. It provides designers with swatches of over 700 colors and gives printers the recipes for making those colors so they come out looking exactly the same no matter where you print it or how many times you print it. If color is important to your brand (for instance with T•Mobile’s trademarked magenta) then you will want to use a specific Pantone color.

RGB stands for red, green and blue. This light-based color system is created when lights are illuminated through the pixels in your monitor and create an even wider, and brighter, gamut than what is generally available for print.

The color wheel is a start for choosing colors. The basic elements of the color wheel provide numerous options for color harmony in design: primary colors (red, blue, yellow), secondary colors (green, orange and purple), tertiary colors ( yellow-orange, red-orange, red-purple, blue-purple, blue-green and yellow-green), complimentary colors (colors on opposite ends of the wheel), analogous colors (three side-by-side colors on the wheel), warm colors (red, orange, yellow) and cool colors (purple, blue, green)…phew, and that’s just the start!